JACKSON – The township has a new garden spot to enjoy thanks to a team up between the township’s Department of Public Works (DPW) and local Girl Scouts.
The joint effort is seeing the growth of a beautiful pollinator garden which is blooming near the Jackson Jungle Play Park at 2 Jackson Drive.
The Girl Scouts thanked the DPW and DPW Superintendent Shawn Bolinsky.
Assistant Girl Scout Troop leader Tami Wolfe said “Four of our girls. Josie Wolfe, Gemma Curatola, Paige Price, and Marly Agban from Troop 50049, based out of Jackson teamed up for their Silver Award Project. This is a community-based project completed by Girl Scout Cadettes between 6th and 8th grade.”
“I cannot express how proud I am of them. All four girls are starting high school this year, so in order to be eligible for the award it needed to be completed by end of September,” Wolfe explained. “They needed to do research and decide what ‘take action project’ they wanted to tackle.”
Wolfe added that each of the girls needed a minimum of 50 working hours. “The focus of the project is on leadership, causes, impact, measurable results, community benefit. They met in person at the library, over Zoom and tons of texting back and forth.”
Marly commented, “I think that the project was a really fun way to give back to our community and to socialize. It was enjoyable to see our final work and it was relieving to see our hard work all together.”
“I definitely thought the project was different from anything that I have done and it was very nice and a good experience. I liked making a garden with my friends while seeing the progress that we were making over time,” Paige said.
Gemma noted, “it was a really fun experience working with all of you guys, and building a garden together really brought us together closer and helped me learn a bunch of new stuff I didn’t know before.”
Josie added that it was “definitely a project worth remembering and cherishing – especially from all the difficult parts that came along with it such as coordinating times when we were all available to even planting. I think we all watched not only the garden grow but ourselves as well.”
Some of the steps along the way included “contacting the town to ask for an area to use for their garden, attending the Monmouth County Master Gardeners’ plant sale/event for research, visit Cicconi’s Farms and I&G Farms and ask for help obtaining plants, take soil samples to correct the levels, amend the soil, plant, water and weed (each girl rotated every day to go and water), build signs and butterfly houses,” Wolfe added.
An open house for the garden was held which involved a seed ball giveaway for those who attended. “The open house was a low-key opening of the garden and anyone that attended got a pollinator seed ball the girls made so they can plant to help the pollinators in their area,” Wolfe remarked.
“We actually held the open house in the rain. It was good for the flowers! We used two pop up canopies. The girls had visitors. I’m sure a lot less than if it was sunny out,” she said. “We even spotted some monarch chrysalis.”
